


The Games

by Bellatrix_Wannabe_89



Series: OQ Movie Week [1]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hunger Games Setting, F/M, OQ Movie Week
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-19
Updated: 2019-03-30
Packaged: 2019-11-24 09:24:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,850
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18163385
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bellatrix_Wannabe_89/pseuds/Bellatrix_Wannabe_89
Summary: Written for Day One of OQ Movie Week; Based on ‘The Hunger Games’. Regina and Robin are forced to watch Henry fight for his survival during the Games. Can a fourteen year old boy with no particularly great skills come out triumphant? Or will they end up having to watch their son die in a twisted teenage Battle Royale?





	1. Chapter 1

The first day she thought Henry was going to die had been surprisingly easy. 

Far easier than she thought it would be, especially after 2 weeks of preparing herself, her husband and her stepson Roland for the fact that Henry probably wasn’t coming home.

Henry Daniel Mills had been chosen for tribute for the 44th Hunger Games just a mere 21 years after his step father Robin Thiefton Locksley survived the 23rd. But there was a significant difference; Robin had been that games favorite son. 

Seventeen years old with blonde hair, soft blue eyes, a body made hard and muscular due to years of hard living chopping down trees in the vast District Seven forests, an accent not often heard in Panem and a skill with a bow that other tributes, past, present or future, could never hope to achieve, a 12/12 in his training score …

He was given a golden bow and a whole quiver of arrows from sponsors in the first ten minutes of the games and somehow every natural dangerous element seemed to be diverted away from him. 

None of the other tributes ever stood a chance.

Robin even knew to play to the cameras from the moment he was reaped. He walked to the podium with a smug smirk, he was just cocky enough during the interviews where he wasn’t unlikeable, he even performed trick shots with his bow during the middle of the games, knowing he was more likely to be given help and be kept alive if he kept the capital entertained.

Henry, however, had been raised in Victor's Village with a mother from District One who had never known hard work and only moved out of her district when her first husband Daniel died of a lung infection while she was pregnant. He was a quiet, kind, shy but smart boy who preferred reading to chopping wood and writing stories as opposed to shooting a bow.

When the reaping happened his lip trembled and tears filled his eyes as he made his way up to the podium shaking. It didn’t help that Regina was screaming his name and the peacekeepers had to hold her and Robin back from going after him. 

When they said their goodbyes Robin told him to play to his strengths, his kindness, his generosity, his decency, reminding him that all they wanted was a good show… 

During the interviews he stammered nervously through them, leaving no lasting impressions apart from the fact that for the first time in the Games history the tribute was related to a victor. His training score was a 6/12, nothing too abysmal but nothing to write home about either.

The moment Regina saw the score, she knew she would never see her son again and she spent the whole night weeping in Robin's arms.

Roland, being only being five years old and still a year away from the mandatory viewing and was safely inside their cabin practicing with the bow his father carved for him. Robin and Regina though were in front of the group gathered outside and staring up at the giant screen showing the games.

The first day she watched, she was numb to everything around her, expecting to watch her son die in the cornucopia in the first few minutes. But rather than fight for resources he ran out into the forest, leaving behind any the bloodbath that claimed eight out of twenty four tributes.

The cameras didn’t show Henry much that first day, instead choosing on the career tributes and alliances, and a good looking seventeen year old from District Four who was quite talented at swordsplay.

Four more were killed throughout the day which left twelve tributes; both boy and girl from districts one, two, six and ten, the good looking girl from four, a small girl from twelve, a boy from five and Henry. 

The next day though, the boy from five was killed from a snake bite and the career alliance killed off both tributes from six. They had no choice but to start showing Henry who had spent his time hiding in the thick brush, working out the best possible way that would avoid others. While he was walking he did something no one ever thought to do before- he began talking to himself. 

He told himself, and those watching, a story about a one handed pirate on an island where you never grow old. He told a story about a woman locked in a tower with hair long enough for a fearless prince to climb, he told the story of an Evil Queen poisoning a princess with skin white as snow, he told stories of a woman who lost her glass slipper at a ball, of a thief who robbed from the rich to give to the poor… 

Henry told stories that felt familiar, like those listening where waking up from a dream that you only vaguely remember and were trying to recapture. They all had heroes and villains, they all took place a long time ago in a land far away, they all had happy endings…

They all started once upon a time.

The people watching him were all captivated. They hung in every word, they gasped when the prince climbed the tower only to find the witch on top of it, they cheered when the shoe fit the maids small foot, and cried when it seemed like the princess had been poisoned by her evil stepmother…

So captivating were these stories that the cameras focused on Henry even more than most of the other tributes, apart from when there was a particularly nasty murder of the District Four boy and an exciting chase between the career tributes and the District Twelve girl that ended with her getting an arrow through the back of her head for her troubles.

Seven people. More than half of the other tributes dead and Henry was not only alive but he finally had gotten gifts from his sponsors; a dagger along with a loaf of brown bread and a canteen of water.

In the pack that floated down to the spot he was in, hidden amongst the trees, he found a note in the pocket hand written from one of the Game masters themselves. 

_ “Why did the Evil Queen hate Snow White so much?” _

Henry smiled as he leaned up against the trunk and began to weave a tale of a manipulative sorcereress, a murdered stable boy and a ten year old princess who told a secret…

As Regina and Robin watched their son tell his tale for the cameras, she began to get nervous. 

She was nervous because now she realized he stood a chance, now she had the worst thing a parent of a tribute could have; hope. Hope that he might survive and come home.

She could barely stand it. She just wanted the games to be over, she just wanted Henry back home in her arms or gone so she could stop being completely terrified every moment she watched that stupid screen.

Robin held her and told her that he would come back, their son would win and come home back to their arms but that didn’t help the sleepless night they followed. 

When they awoke the next morning, they found out that the last four career tributes had found Henry’s tree and had hunted him down like hounds would track down a rabbit.

Her little boy was running through the forests as fast as his legs could carry him, gasping for breath and his dagger in his hand. The arrows whizzed by so close he felt the fletcher rustle his hair.

“HENRY, RUN!” Regina screamed while Robin held her as tight as he could, his whole body trembling and his voice shaking as he told her the same mantra he’d been repeating over and over and over since the moment he was chosen.

“He’s going to win.”

The other tributes were closer now. One particularly strong boy from District Two was sprinting as fast as he could and was now away from the pack of career tributes and right on Henry’s heels, a large blood stained ax in his hand as tall as he was in his hand.

Henry went to jump over a tangle of tree roots but he had misjudged the height and his feet got tangled up as punishment. He fell face down on the forest ground with a painful cry and in less than half a second the District Two boy was upon him.  He yelled triumphantly as he raised his ax above his head, the sun gleaming off the metal sprinkled with red.

Regina couldn’t watch anymore. She turned in Robin's  arms, letting out a sob as she clutched at his shirt, knowing she would hear the cannon soon and her son would be taken from her. Sure enough a moment passed, a shout and a cry, and the boom of the cannon signifying a death.

Regina opened her mouth to scream when Robin cut her off with a frantic, “it’s okay! He’s okay, Regina, he’s okay!”

The brown eyed woman spared half a peek and saw Henry frantically pushing the large District Boy 2 on top of him off, his dagger deeply embedded in his chest.

“I’m sorry,” she heard her little boy whisper to the dead teenager. He let out a sob as he buried his hands in his hair as if he wasn’t quite sure what to do. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry…”

His voice was hitched in terror and panic and genuine apologeticness and he was trembling so hard he could barely stand but when he heard the other tributes closing in, he yanked the dagger from his chest, tore a hunk of bread off his loaf and tossed it a few feet in front of the body before he dived into the woods and flattened himself to the ground, hiding himself with the brush as well as he could.

The trick worked. When the other tributes came across the body they incorrectly assumed Henry has continued running on the designated path and sprinted off in the entirely wrong direction, making sure to grab the blood stained ax.

“Henry kicked him,” Robin explained to Regina once Henry was out of danger and he had climbed up a tree a few feet in as fast as he could until he was hidden amongst the branches and leaves. “He just meant to get him off balance but the kid fell on his dagger. Henry didn’t mean to kill him.”

Regina snuffed away her unfallen tears and shook her head. “That won’t matter to him. It won’t, Robin, he’ll see himself as... as a murderer.”

He tightened his grip on his wife. “One day he’ll realize he had no other choice, he’ll be able to tell himself he had no choice but to kill.”

She looked up at her husband and saw her husband with a far off haunted look in his blue eyes, the same look he got every time he watched the games and was reminded of his own three kills; a sixteen year old boy from five, an eighteen year old girl from two and a fifteen year old from eleven which won him the game. 

Regina cuddled up as close to him as she possibly could, snuggling up against him and letting her stray tears fall on his shirt, whispering how sorry she was that the capital did that to him. 

Down to six.

The screen stayed focused on Henry as he covered his mouth to cover his sobs, repeating over and over how sorry he was, how he didn’t mean to kill him, how he just wanted to go home. Henry was losing it. Panem’s favorite author was losing it on live TV

Another gift floated down to his branch, a tonic that would help calm his nerves but Henry shook his head and simply put it in his bag, choosing instead to just take a few sips of water.

He wouldn’t drug himself during the games. 

Shaking to the point he was barely able to function, he somehow managed to put the cap to the water back on and forced himself to take a deep breath.

“Once upon a time,” he said in a trembling breath, wiping away his tears. “In a land faraway, there…. there was a newborn princess call- called Aurora. For- for they named her af- after the dawn…”

As he told his story, Regina, Robin and the rest of Panem watched as his breathing evened out, his tears showed and eventually stopped and by the time he got to the handsome prince kissing his sleeping beauty awake, three separate cannon booms had gone off.

Down to three.

The games would end tomorrow. Henry’s fate would be decided by then, and Regina and Robin would either have a corpse they would never even be able to give a proper burial or their son back. 

Neither slept that night, both Robin and Regina kept their eyes locked on a mostly dark screen, watching as the blonde haired seventeen year old girl named Emma Swan from District Four who held an old fashioned  knights sword walk carefully along the path looking for the last two tributes and a tall blonde girl from District Ten named Mal, a powerful blow torch in one hand and a sword with a dragons head on the pummel on the other, did the same, while Henry stayed in his tree, clutching his dagger to his chest.

None of the tributes realized how close they were to the other...

Finally Emma and Mal met up just at the base of Henry’s tree and both froze, as if, even after all this time, neither wanted to fight and would have rather ran if given the chance. But they both shook out their shock of literally running into either there would-be murderers or victims and began their deadly dance.

A rather brilliant almost dazzling fight between the two women thanks to the fire it almost appeared Mal seemed to breathe took place while Henry stayed hidden in his tree, trying to muffle his frantic breathing as he heard the clang of swords and the roar of the fire from the blow torch that lit up the fire with red and orange flames that enveloped the heavy brush, along with Henry’s tree.

The flames inched closer and closer to his resting spot, the small boy crying out in fear and pain as the hellish red flames licked at his feet. 

“JUMP!” Robin screamed at his step-son while Regina sobbed as she saw the flames begin to take over the branch supporting him. “HENRY, JUMP!”

It was as if he could hear his parents because in the next moment, just before his branch was about to fall into the hells ape below, he leapt out of his hiding spot, landing with a painful cry right behind the ongoing fight.

“Run!” cried Regina but before she could even open her mouth Henry was up and running, a noticeable limp in his left leg and dark red blood soaking his jeans.

Mal made the mistake of pausing to look over Emmas shoulder at the boy who had took off running and, in that one moment of hesitation, Emma ran her through with her sword- a clean painless strike to the heart. A moment later a cannon boomed and Emma took off running after Henry with the flames chasing the both of them

Down to two.

There were two left. Two tributes left. Henry outlasted 22 other tributes, career tributes, those who underestimated him because of his district, those who got far more gifts from sponsors… 

Henry outlasted them all. All but one. 

Emma caught up to Henry easily enough and when she did, Regina fell to her knees and a sob ripped past her lips, expecting Emma to run him through as she did with Mal.

But the flames licking at both their backs made it impossible for either to focus on anything but getting out of this hellish apocalypse.

“Come on, Kid!” Emma yelled, sheathing her sword and grabbing Henry by the arm, pulling him faster and faster out of the alit forest as the fire raged all around and behind them. “Run!”

“I can’t!” Henry cried, the blood pouring down his leg even faster as he struggled to run alongside her. “I can’t!”

“You wanna be burned alive?!”

Henry offered nothing but a short lived sob but the words spurred him on and he managed to run alongside the older teenager.

“Come on, Henry!” Robin cried, his voice panicked and hitched in fright to the point it frightened Regina who never heard him that terrified before. The strange accent he spoke with was unlike anything she ever heard in Panem but on a normal day it was warm and comforting. Now though… now it was full of terror and fear. 

“Henry, run!” Regina screamed frantically as the fire surrounded the two of them.

It was too much. She couldn’t do it, she turned and buried her face into Robins chest once again. She took several deep breaths, inhaling the scent of forest, of earth and pine and fresh air.

Her son would die. This was it. The first kill had been luck but there was no luck to be had in an inferno with an older far more skilled person running alongside him.

She closed her eyes as she heard the cracklings of an overhead branch, Henry’s scream, Robin yelling ‘NO!’ and then a loud collective gasp followed by what sounded like a deadly rainstorm of almost biblical proportions.

There was a sudden silence throughout those watching the screen and then a voice. Her Robins voice, in a soft mumble, the sweetest words she had ever heard in her life.

“She pushed him out of the way…” 

Regina blinked away her tears, hardly daring to believe it. She glanced up and saw Robin staring flabbergasted at the large screen and, hardly daring to believe it, slowly looked at the viewing herself and sure enough, Emma Swan laid there crushed beneath a heavy fallen branch that weighed more than a grown man  and Henry sitting a few feet in front of her, his knees pulled to his chest, his head bowed and his body shaking with sobs as the man made rainstorm raged around him, doing its best to put out the fire.

The moment the fire was out the sun was out again, shining brightly on the small fourteen year old boy.

“Congratulations to the victor of the 44th Hunger Games, District Sevens own Henry Mills, the Author of Panem!” a booming voice announced before the inspirational music erupted as they showed Henry being picked up from the arena.

Robin helped Regina up off from the ground and wrapped his arms around her. She rested her head against his chest and whispered against the forest smelling fabric the same thing he had told her time after time, again and again with a slight variation.

“He won.”

 

Please Review!


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I actually had no plans for a follow up from the original first chapter, it honestly was supposed to just be a one shot but I really didn’t expect such a positive response to it so I choose to make this a four parter. I hope y’all enjoy it

_ The fire was burning everything. It burned all around him, and no matter what Henry did he couldn’t seem to escape it. _

_ But the flames surrounding him weren’t what was terrifying him. It was the blonde woman with the broken back whose spine and ribs were crushed and twisted violently that frightened him, it was the large boy with thick dark blood pouring out of a hole in his chest holding an ax that made him want to curl up in a ball and sob, it was the woman with a sword in her heart who died because he distracted her who made him want to scream.  _

_ There were other faces too. Faces of the parents of the dead teenagers staring at him through the flames. _

_ “I’m sorry!” Henry cried as the three of them surrounded him, the flames melting their flesh, exposing charred bone and muscle underneath. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean it! I didn’t want this!” _

_ The corpses didn’t listen to his please and moved in closer, not caring about the flames burning them.  _

_ “I’m sorry!” Henry screamed through his desperate sobs as they all came closer, smothering him, surrounding him, killing him... “I’m sorry, please! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’M SORRY!!!” _

 

The fourteen year old gasped as he flew up in his bed, ice cold sweat soaking him right through the bone. It took a long minute before the images in his mind, the flames and the corpses and the stoic faces of their parents faded from his mind and his bedroom came back into focus.

After Henry arrived back home he had been given the choice; continue living in his old home with his family or get a new home in Victor's Village all to himself. He tried spending one night away from his family but it was far too quiet for his liking (plus he wasn’t exactly a master chef or housekeeper) so before the sun had even risen he moved back in with his family and into his old bedroom, content with the knowledge that when Robin died and the capital kicked them all out of his home, Henry, Roland and his mother would still have a place to stay without having to move to the poorer part of the district.

That was a week ago. 

A week since he arrived home after more interviews, more primping, more making up stories on the spot to excited capital dwellers who were eager to hear a tale from ‘The Arthur of Panem’. 

A week since the District Four mentor Killian Jones, the previous years winner who even after losing his hand somehow managed to win by fashioning a hook to his stump, nearly killed Henry in a blind rage not even twenty four hours after he escaped the Games with his life for what happened to Emma, who, Henry later found out, had been dating Killian since they were in middle school. It was only the other party goers wanting to hear the end of the story Henry was telling that made them want to pull the one handed man screaming and sobbing about his lost love off of him. 

A week since President Snow privately ‘encouraged’ Henry to perhaps come up with some stories about the ‘giving and generous capital rather than fairytales that tended to give people false hope about their lives.’

Henry took a deep breath, running his hands through his hair before he got out of bed, pulling on a T-shirt and a pair of sleeper pants over his briefs and headed downstairs.

He had nightmares ever since they pulled him from the flooded forest, the smoke rising from the lower branches and ground where the water couldn’t hit that well but none were as graphic or terrifying as the one he had just had and he needed something to erase the violent disturbing thoughts that wrecked him with pain and terror and guilt.

His mentor John Little, a large muscular victor who won his games two years before Robin using only a quarter staff and who was a close friend to Henry’s step dad (who Robin asked personally to mentor him since the rules made it impossible for immediate family to mentor tributes), pulled Henry aside after the Games and offered to sneak him a tonic made special in the capital to snuff out nightmares; something the capital forbid victor's to use (the capital never wanted those memories or nightmares to go away. Even if you won; they still managed to find a way to exert their power over you) but Henry refused. 

As it was in the Games, he didn’t trust any medicine or drug made from the people who were cheering for his death just days prior.

He did trust District Seven finest Cherry Wood Whiskey though. 

Henry made his way down the stairs as quiet as he could, knowing which creaky step to skip over, and tip-toed silent as a mouse into the dark kitchen. The teenager went immediately to the fridge, reaching up top and furrowing his brow when he didn’t feel the sturdy glass bottle where it was always kept.

“Looking for this?”

The kitchen light came on, nearly blinding Henry who whipped around and saw Robin sitting at the table with the bottle in front of him and a full glass of the reddish-brown liquor.

“Robin,” Henry stammered nervously. “I… I didn’t, I just- you-... I… I- I didn’t-... please don’t tell my mom!”

He surprised Henry not with a glare but with a soft understanding smile. “You’re not in trouble, Henry, I just want to talk.”

Still not trusting that he wasn’t about to be grounded or shouted at Henry took a cautious seat at the table opposite the blue eyed man. 

“I was wondering when you would make your way down here,” said Robin. “You lasted far longer than I did.”

“What do you mean?”

“What I mean is that for every day after the games I was drunk,” Robin explained. “I would tell myself only one glass to steady my hand and help with the nightmares…” Robin shared a joyless smile with Henry, the kind that could turn to sobs in a heartbeat. “Nine times out of ten I would end up half a bottle deep and passed out at my table.”

Henry furrowed his brow, eyeing the bottle in front of the blue eyed man. He never saw him drunk, not once not ever. He only saw him take an occasional nip not even three times a year, usually when the games were approaching and he had to get ready to parade in front of the cameras again.

“I’ve never even hardly seen you drink much less get blacked out drunk,” Henry said. 

“That’s because I stopped after my first year as a mentor. I got drunk during the games, incredibly drunk, couldn’t even stand up. I passed out the second night and then the next thing I know John was shaking me awake and telling me that my tribute died.” Robin looked down at the table, scratching a bit of wood with his fingernail. “She was popular enough not to be completely written off but not so popular that sponsors would give her gifts without prodding from her drunk useless mentor, a gift like a first aid kit to help with a fast acting infection from a dirty blade that cut her in the cornucopia.” He finally looked up, lost blue eyes staring into astonished hazel. “She was thirteen years old.”

An unexplainable lump grew in Henry’s throat that made it impossible for him to swallow and when he tried speaking around it his voice was a pathetic teary whisper. “You never told me that story before.”

“I never told  _ anyone _ that story. Not even your mother knows it, only John and you. The rest of the Panem thinks the sponsors just didn’t want to waste good medical supplies on a girl who was probably going to die anyway.”

Now he was truly at a loss. Henry knew his step father told his mother everything. They were soulmates, they were meant to be, they were happy and in love and content… why then would Robin hide things from her?

Seeing the confusion in Henry’s eyes, Robin reached across the table and grabbed hold of Henry’s hand. “I love your mother. She’s everything to me. But there’s some things…” Henry could feel Robins hand begin to tremble. “There’s some things that she won’t ever be able to understand. As open and as loving and giving as she is, as un-judgmental as she truly in her heart of hearts is, she will never understand what goes through our minds, or the 42 other victors mind. She, or Roland hopefully, won’t ever understand the nightmares or the self hatred or the anger or the… the guilt.”

Tears flooded Henry’s eyes. The guilt was the worst part so far. That he lived while 23 others died, him being responsible for three of those, was the worst feeling in the world and one Henry knew, no matter how much of that rust colored liquor he drank, he would never be able to get over it.

“I just...” Henry had to stop for fear of that impossibly hard lump suffocating him and take a deep breath, not even bothering to wipe the tears from his eyes because he knew they were going to return. “It’s not fair.”

“What isn’t?”

“That I lived and they didn’t. They didn’t wanna be there any more than I did and they didn’t have to die… I didn’t mean to kill anyone but they still died.” He had to cover his mouth with his hand to muffle the sobs less he wake his mother or Roland up, lowering his voice to a shaky whisper that Robin could barely hear, like if he spoke it louder then all of Panem would hear his confession and punish him. “I’m a murderer.”

Robin shook his head. He wouldn’t let Henry believe that, he couldn’t let him believe that, it was wrong and it wasn’t fair to Henry, to Robin, to any of the victors that came before them or the ones who would come after. He moved his chair from across the elegantly decorated table to right by his side so he could rest a hand in his shoulder and look into his eyes, making sure Henry heard every single word.

“Listen to me… You are NOT a murderer, Henry. You didn’t choose any of what happened, no more than I did.”

“I killed Leroy,” the teenager said, learning the name of the boy who tried to kill him with his ax only after the fact in the post game interviews. “I killed Mal, I killed Emma…”

“You protected yourself, that’s all you did. You have nothing to feel guilty about.”

Robin almost wanted to laugh. How many times has he told himself that same thing when he saw the faces of those whose lives he took in his own Games in his nightmares? How many times did he tell himself to rid himself of the guilt they still consumed him?

How many times has he told himself that whenever he picked up his bow and he was taken back to his jungle style arena and waiting until his victims saw him before he released his arrow, telling himself that it was self defense because he had been spotted. 

It was a lie. Robin knew it was, no matter how many times he tried to tell himself that story, but for Henry it wasn’t. He hadn’t meant to kill any of them, and he was not about to let guilt unfairly consume him. 

“You did that you had to do to survive,” Robin reminded him. “There’s no shame in that, Henry, and that girl choose to sacrifice herself for you. She could have let you get hit by that tree, she could have let you burned, she could have shoved her sword in your back but she choose to save you. Emma died a hero and is being hailed ‘the savior of Panem’.” 

Robin bit back his opinion that the Capital would be using Emma’s heroism as a way to prove that even in death you were able to make a mark in Panem, something the victor was sure she wouldn’t have wanted.

“I just… I don’t understand why she didn’t just let me die,” Henry told Robin, casting his eyes to the clean tiled floor, terrified he would see in Robin's eyes the same shame and hatred he felt for himself. “She could have won, she could be with her family, she… she could be alive.”

Robin lifted Henry’s chin so that he was looking the small boy in his eyes. “And you wouldn’t be. Everytime you think about their faces, everytime you think about their families, everytime you think about ending it because of that guilt, don’t look at me like that, you WILL go through it if you haven’t already,” Robin said in an answer to his step sons panicked eyes. “Just remember that, Henry. They may be gone but if any of them survived, you would be dead instead. And death is worse than everything you’re feeling right now.” 

Robin offered Henry a humorless smile, the pain that he fought against showing his family now as clear in his eyes as if he was screaming it, revealing it only now because he now had someone who understood that coldness and pain inside him. “Or so I’m told.”

The older victor stood up and clapped Henry on the shoulder once more, sliding the full glass towards the teenage boy.

“I won’t tell you how to cope,” he told him, his voice almost frighteningly calm. “But remember that you belong to the capital now and they don’t… they don’t like their victors to be shown as incapacitated, Henry.” 

Robin reaches around and rubbed the back where Henry knew there were violent criss-cross scars on his back that he never thought to ask about, always assuming it happened in the Games but now… He had a feeling it wasn’t just the death of his tribute that helped Robin curb his drinking.

With a final slap on the shoulder Robin turned and went back upstairs to bed leaving the young boy staring at the glass in front of him and feeling like he swallowed a bucket load of sand and had gone without water for forty years.

Henry was thirsty. Thirstier than he ever thought he could be and he knew all the water in the world wouldn’t be able to quench it, nor would all the late night talks with his step dad or the self-help motivational speeches help him either.

The only thing that would be able to help him as a matter of fact was that reddish-brown sitting in that tumbler glass that would rightfully punish him with a sharp pain that would make his eyes water and burn his throat on the way down.

So, taking a deep breath, ‘Panem’s Favorite Arthur’, a fourteen year old boy who was still too young to grow a single hair on his chin yet, grabbed hold of the glass placed in front of him and lifted it to the Capital cameras he knew were watching him and his family.

“To Panem,” Henry muttered out loud before he took a deep breath, brought the whiskey to his lips, and drank it down…

 

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	3. Chapter 3

Henry never really thought about the victory tour much. Once a year, halfway between games, the victor would come to his district, say a few well prepared statements, eat the venison, wild rabbits, wild turkeys, wild berries and the other foods commonly found in the vasts forests of District Seven and move on to District Six.

The families of the fallen tributes would stand on a platform with a photo of their dead child behind them letting the hollow words about how strong and honorable and noble their family members ‘sacrifice’ was wash over them.

Twice since Henry had been old enough to attend the victory tour party the victor had been the one to kill one of his districts tributes. The first was an eighteen year old career tribute from District Two named Owen Skies who killed a District Seven girl named Merida, one of Robins favorite tributes he mentored who showed considerable skill with a bow who almost rivaled his own talents.

Owen didn’t kill her quickly. He took his time, torturing her, electrocuting her with a device he jerry rigged from the cornucopia over and over, cutting her, touching her intimately against her will…

When he came to Seven for his Victory Tour and he saw Merida’s mother, father and three young brothers on that podium, he looked directly over at them and smiled, like killing and torturing a fifteen year old girl gave him the greatest pleasure he ever experienced.

Then a year before Henry’s games a District Four victor named Ariel killed his friend Violet after literally running into her during the middle of the Games. Both tributes stared wide eye and terrified at one another, both of them frozen, both of them terrified to move for fear that they would think the other would be reaching for their weapons.

After a long tense moment Violet twitched first.

Ariel stabbed her with what appeared to be a four pronged knife out of fear of death and ran off into the urban arena complete with burning cars, tall broken down buildings, and speeding subway trains that more than one tribute was pushed in front of.

The red headed victor mumbled through her speech, barely looking up from the cards and Henry had been angry, infuriated, ready to kill the sixteen year old for not even bothering to look at her family during her speech but Robin told him that was normal for a victor. They didn’t want to think about their kills, they didn’t want to look in the eyes of their family members, they didn’t wanna make the tributes they killed more human. Henry rolled his eyes, shoved Robin out of the way and went up to his room, not having the stomach to go to the party and see his friends murderer enjoying food and wine and fame.

Ariel killed herself three days after she got home from her tour.

Now it was Henry’s turn for his Victory Tour. A chance for the lucky people of Panem to see ‘Panem’s Favorite Arthur’ tour the districts, weave magical tales, eat, dance, be merry and honor the sacrifice of the fallen tributes.

The day before he was supposed to leave Robin told the same thing that night in the kitchen months back, that the Capital didn’t like their victors to be drunk and he would HAVE to quit the drinking he was failing at hiding from his mother.

But Henry couldn’t stop. No matter how many times he and Robin had their late night talks that always ended in tears, no matter how many times he told himself it was self defense and that he had been forced into murdering these people, the firey pain that burned his throat and stomach was worth it considering it was one of the only things that hid his victims faces from his nightmares and memories.

So he made an empty promise to his step dad that he would cut down on the whiskey but the moment he, his mentor Little John, his stylist Ruby and his Capital Escort Blue, a short rather cross woman who liked to dress in rather eccentric blue outfits with bright blue makeup and hair, stepped on the train and headed to the poor District Twelve, Henry opened up a bottle of District Sevens Cherry Wood Whiskey and began to pour.

The stops in twelve and eleven were easy to handle. He never met their tributes, he didn’t have a hand in their deaths so he got through the prepared statement Blue wrote him painlessly. Their parties, especially twelves, were meager and rather short lived, not to mention no one ask him for a story off the top of his head, but Henry didn’t mind; he just wanted to get this tour over as soon as he could and go home.

District Ten was Mal Dragonly’s district. He had been the one to distract her when he jumped from the tree that she set on fire. He didn’t even realize what he did until he saw the replay in the post Game interviews. Emma may have killed her but Henry was the one that made her drop her concentration, he was the one who made her look over Emma’s shoulder, he was the reason for a split second she stopped fighting and gave her opponent an opportunity to murder her.

When he got to his stage and saw a little girl he was told later was her little sister Lily, an angry dark haired twelve year old who was looking at Henry like he had been the one to put the sword through Mal’s heart which, he thought to himself as he held back his tears ignoring the sharp glare she was throwing him from the podium, he might as well have…

The first half of the speech wasn’t bad. The generic ‘I’m honored to be here amongst the family of the fallen tributes’ part they all heard year after year was easy. He then started talking about the male tribute, a fifteen year old named Stefan King. He told his small family how he didn’t know Stefan but he saw him in the training arena and commented how amazing he was at survival instincts and how much he loved being able to start a fire with only his hands and if it had been the tributes against the elements he would have won it all.

That was a trick Robin taught him before he left for his tour. If you didn’t know the tribute talk about an aspect of training where ‘if only that tool or that aspect  had been allowed he/she would have won it all.’

It gave the families a little spark of joy, Robin explained. To let them know their tribute found something he excelled at and was able to find enjoyment in something during their last few days. Archery, survival instincts, sword play, knife throwing, camouflage painting, underwater basket weaving, it didn’t matter, you just give the families SOMETHING that their tributes could have enjoyed doing.

When it was time to speak about Mal he wanted nothing more than to bury his head in the cards, mumble through it as quick as he could and go back to his room and drink until he got to district nine.

But he remembered the pain he felt when Ariel looked down at her cards the whole time she talked about Violet. He realized now of course it wasn’t because she didn’t care about the death but she was just trying to get through it without throwing up on the stage in front of everyone. Ariel didn’t look up because she didn’t care about Violets death, it was because she cared too much, the exact opposite of what Owen did during his tour when he spoke to Merida’s family.

But still, he didn’t want Lily to ever feel that pain he felt when it came to Violet and hopefully that little girl would never understand what he was feeling right now so he forced himself to look up during his speech where he talked about how much strength and intelligence and resilience Mal must have had to get so close to the end and how the fire had been a genius move. Then he took a deep breath, looked directly in the eyes of the angry twelve year old and told her he was sorry for distracting her sister, that he would give anything to take back what happened and wish he just thought of trying to jump to the next tree over rather than down on the ground right next to the fight between Mal and Emma.

 _Or just die in the flames themselves,_ he thought to himself as he flipped to the last card. _Even an eternity of darkness would be better than this guilt…_

He got through the last card, more empty non personal sentiments finished with the motto of his country, “Panem today, Panem tomorrow, Panem forever,” was said without incident or much stumbling and after the lukewarm applause he sped walked back into the staging area and made his way over towards his bag where his precious bottle was waiting for him.

The party was without incident as well save for Lily coming up to Henry, looking him right in the eyes and telling him, “if he hasn’t if distracted her, Mal would have killed him no question and won the Games.”

Despite District Ten specializing in livestock and their party containing fabulously cooked steaks and lamb and pork, a welcome sight after the feeble layout of Twelve and all vegetarian layout of Eleven, he decided he was no longer hungry and went back to his room where he drank until the liquor granted him a nightmare induced sleep where Lily was standing in front of Henry and refusing to let him run away from the flames.

His tour in Districts Nine, Eight, Six and Five was both easy and hard to get through. Easy because he had no connections to those tributes and he could read the cards without incident and without angry family members blaming him for their tributes deaths.

But it was increasingly hard because he knew every speech, every party, every train ride was getting him closer and closer to Emma’s district, the sunny ocean-side District Four where the Capital gets their seafood from. He would have to look at her family, he would have to face her one handed boyfriend who nearly killed him last time they saw each other and talk about the woman who for reasons he still couldn’t understand pushed him out of the alway and gave her own life for his.

The night before the train would pull into District Four’s station Henry drank nearly half the bottle hoping that just once he would get drunk enough to forget her face, the feel of her hands on his back as she pushed him, the sound of her spine snapping when the tree fell on top of her, the look of the light leaving her green eyes.

No such luck.

So the ride from the station to where the victory tour was being held he drank even more, not even to quiet the memories and sounds and smells of the smoke and flames but just to try to get his hand to quit trembling, something his hand began shaking whenever he went too long without a small drink.

He was given the cards, told the name of the male tribute, Jack Sparrow who only had a father and a younger brother named Will and the names of Emma’s family; a mother named Snow, a father named David and a younger brother Henry’s age named Neal.

As he made his way to the stage, he saw the families on their pedestal and he couldn't turn away from the photo of the blonde woman behind them. Neither Snow nor David looked mad at him, not like Lily or Killian had looked at him anyway, it was far far worse in fact.

They looked heartbroken. They were heartbroken and lost and struggling to keep it together and if Henry saw a single tear in any of their faces he knew he was going to lose it.

“It is an honor to be here today and to be with the families of your fallen tributes,” he began, his voice such a low murmur that the microphone was barely picking up. “Jack and… And uh, um…” He swallowed hard as he glanced up from his cards, his eyes darting towards the family standing in front of the large photo of the woman who saved him.

He couldn’t stand the look that Snow was giving him, that look that if he didn’t know better almost appeared as sympathy, like she felt bad for his struggling but he knew better.

What mother would feel bad for their child’s murderer?

“I’m sorry,” Henry muttered to the gathered spectators when he realized a long enough silence had taken place where it had become unavoidably awkward. He tried to take a deep breath but the air and the next words stuck in his throat. “Jack and… Jack and Em- Emma-fought bravely and honorably and their-... their district should be proud of their sacrifices.”

Henry needed a drink. Bad. More than he ever needed one before. How on earth was he going to get through this?

“I didn’t know Jack but I- I saw him train in the arena,” Henry continued as he fought against his own body not wanting to speak. His clothes were soaked with sweat and the cold chill that accompanied that was close to overwhelming. “He was- he did well with-... with um, with sword fighting. He enjoyed it quite a bit and if- if it had been merely us against the- wait, I- I’m sorry. If it had been- if swords had been the only weapons allowed he would be the victor standing before you right now.”

Henry wasn’t sure how much longer he could do this. Not only was it getting harder and harder to speak but his legs were shaking so violently he could barely stand and his hands were trembling so bad that when he went to flip the card he ended dropping all of them.

Tears filled his eyes as he fell to his knees, struggling to pick up the thin index cards that contained Blue’s tiny pixie like handwriting that was nearly illegible. When he finally managed to grab hold of them he stood again, having to hold onto the microphone stand to be able to not collapse into a puddle of tears and sweat on the stage.

“I- It was an honor to fight along- no that- that’s the wrong card..”

A sob escaped him as he hurried to get them back into the proper order but half were upside down, the other half were backwards and Blue’s  tiny writing made it nearly impossible to quickly decipher what he was supposed to say next and then to add to his humiliation a little more, a tears fell onto his notes and smudged the writing even more.

He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t be out here anymore, he had to get out of here.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered into the mic, his eyes darting over to Emma’s family before he turned and ran back inside the staging area where John was waiting for him.

The large man immediately wrapped his arms around the teenage boy he helped raise who clutched his jacket and sobbed into his chest, shaking so hard his mentor had to steady himself before he could comfort him.

“You’re alright, Kid,” John told him softly, stroking his hair. “You’re okay, Henry, you’re alright...”

“I didn’t mean for her to die!” he sobbed, his fists tightening around the leather coat. “I didn’t, I- I didn’t want her to push me out of the way!”

“I know you didn’t, Kid, I know… you’re alright, Henry, you’re safe now.”

“I want my mom! I want my mom, I wanna go home!”

“Four more stops. Four stops and that’s the end of it… just four more stops… come on, you’re alright, Henry, calm down.”

John didn’t wanna mention that the Games never ended. They every year he would be dragged before the Capital, forced to give interviews, mentor tributes who had a 1-24 chance of dying, share bedsides with people who had enough money to buy him for the night…

But Henry didn’t need to hear all that right now.

When the young boy finally calmed down enough where the sobs had slowed into tears Henry finally stepped away from Robin's best friend and his brothers Godfather, taking a shaky breath to try to calm his frayed nerves. John clapped a massive hand on the shoulder, accident making the boy he promised Robin he would look out for stumble.

“You okay now?”

“No he is not!”

John and Henry turned and saw an irate Blue storming up to the two victors with an apprehensive Ruby struggling to keep up, herlong furry brown ears flattened nervously to her head.

Ruby Lucas was as beautiful as was possible for a woman to be with sultry brown eyes, a tall thin body and dark brown hair streaked with thick stripes of blood-red color. Her surgeries, though, had cost her some of her beauty in Henry’s opinion but by capital standards she was an exotic animalistic beauty that nearly every man and woman wanted.

Ruby had gotten her ears modified to where rather than human ears placed where they should be, she had brown furry wolf ears on the top of her head and a thick curved brown wolf's tail poking out under her fire-engine red leather skirt.

But if you ignored the ears and tail she was quite the beauty who right now looked rather nervous thanks to the irate woman standing in front of her.

“You humiliated me in front of the Capital!” Blue shouted at the teenager. “They all saw you lose it in front of EVERYONE!”

“Take it easy,” John ordered her but she laid him little mind.

“They are going to think I did a horrible job preparing you and your speech! Not to mention all of that hard work Ruby out into making you look somewhat attractive is all gone to waste thanks to your tears and blubbering!”

“It’s- it’s fine,” Ruby assured Henry rather quickly. He noticed her tail had gone between her legs. “Really, it’s just some streaked mascara and smudged foundation, I can redo it.”

“It must certainly is NOT fine! You humiliated us, Henry! I hope you’re proud of yourself!”

“HEY!”

Blue, Henry and Ruby whipped towards John who had narrowed his two brown eyes into angry skits. He stormed over to the blue haired woman and shoved a finger into her face.

“Do you remember how I won in my games? By using only a quarterstaff. All that is, is a really heavy wooden stick that you beat the ever living shit out of people with.” He took a step closer to her, effectively bridging the distance between them. “There are a lot of really heavy wooden sticks between here and Seven and if you talk to Henry like that again, I just might find one and give you a demonstration of how I tied for most kills in a single game.”

Blue’s eyes went wide with astonishment and terror flooded her face and filled her for a moment but then fury replaced it and she drew herself up to all 4’11 of her height.

“I am a citizen of the Capital, you cannot threaten me!”

“Well I’m a goddamn Victor so I have earned the right to threaten anyone I want! Now go back to your hotel or the train or wherever, I don’t give a shit but leave us alone NOW!”

There was a tense standoff for a moment between the large Victor and the small Escort but his threat eventually won out and Blue stormed off, mumbling about the arrogance of Victors. Once they were alone John took a deep breath and turned back towards his mentor who, as upsetting as the situation was, couldn’t help the shy smile when he saw Blue get what was coming to her.

“You okay?” John asked with a far softer tone than what he talked to Blue with, receiving a nod as an answer.

“Yeah. Yeah I’m alright.” Henry took a deep breath, wiping his eyes with his shirt. “I just wanna go back to my room and sleep.”

“You mean get drunk and pass out.”

Henry flashed his mentor a sad smile, not even bothering to offer a rebuttal. “You know me so well.”

John let out a heavy sigh, his eyes full of sadness for the state of this young one time bright eyed imaginative boy who Robin would share Henry’s handwritten stories with the crew he worked with to bring some semblance of joy into his friends lives.

In the six months following the Games, Henry was too busy picking up a bottle to waste time picking up pen and putting it to paper. Thankfully the people in the district knew enough not to ask him for one, realizing his stories had turned into something horrible and negative for him and knew he only told them to stay alive but the people in the Capital wouldn’t have the common sense those that lived in the Districts did and John knew they would hound him for stories and tales that he knew wasn’t in Henry’s heart anymore.

John wouldn’t make him tell his stories, but he would make him do this…

“You can go drink and pass out and skip the party, Four is rich enough where you wouldn’t be insulting them if you didn’t eat. But you have to go talk to her family.”

A violent shake of his head. “No.”

“They deserve this. You didn’t kill her but they have a right to come to terms with what happened. You can’t take that away from them.”

“I can’t see them, John, I can’t.” Almost as quick as they dried up his tears began again. “I killed their daughter, Emma should be on this tour, not me.”

“Henry-...”

“They hate me… How can you make me go out there and face someone who hates me?”

“Would it be better if we talked in private?”

Henry, John and Ruby turned towards the new additional voices and saw, much to the young boys horror, Emma’s parents walking in the side door flanked by two peacekeepers.

All at once his heart began pounding. He began sweating, stammering out unintelligible words, his legs shook and grabbing into John’s jacket was the only thing that kept him standing outright.

“I’m sorry.” His voice was a harsh sobering whisper that he was almost sure they couldn’t hear. “I’m so sorry, I- I didn’t… Please don’t hate me.”

He almost wanted to laugh at the childish plea. Who was he to ask anything of this family much less ask them not to hate him for killing their daughter?

Henry expected anger, the same furious anger that he would have had if Ariel asked him to not hate her for killing Violet, but instead what he got was even worse than yelling and cursing and heated glares and threats like Lily gave him.

What he got was sympathy. Emma’s parents actually looked sorry for him, especially her mother. Their eyes were red from fallen tears sure, but there was also pity in their gazes and condolences for what HE was going through.

“We don’t hate you, Henry,” Snow told him, saying it with such conviction that Henry almost believed him. “We don’t, we just wanted to talk to you.”

Henry glanced at John who just gave him a curt nod, clapping a strong calloused hand on his shoulder before he nodded to Ruby and the two of them left the staging area leaving Henry and the family along with the two peacekeepers who accompanied them to keep the Victor safe.

Henry closed his eyes and flinched when he heard the door shut behind Ruby and John, expecting an avalanche of screams and curses to rain down on him but instead all that came was patient silence until he choose to open his eyes.

He shifted his gaze from David to Snow whole John's words rang loudly in his head. They had a right to face the person who killed their daughter, they had a right to look into the eyes of the person who was responsible for Emma’s demise.

Taking a deep breath Henry forced himself to look at their faces while he spoke, willing his voice to remain as steady as he could make it which in all honesty wasn’t much.

“I-... I’m sor-.” Henry closes his eyes and locked his lips. The words stuck in his throat the same as they did at that podium only this time he pushed through the dryness of his throat. “I’m sorry for what I did… I’d give anything to take it back but I can’t.” He wiped his eyes with the back of his sleeve. “Emma should be on this Victory Tour, she deserves to be alive right now; not me.”

That damned pitying sympathy looks again. Why didn’t they just scream at him, show anger, hate him, curse him, put him out of his misery…

“You do deserve to be here, Henry,” Snow told him as if his words had physically wounded him.

Henry ignored the green eyed woman. “I should have died in that fire, she shouldn’t have pushed me out of the way and it’s my fault she isn’t here right now.”

David stepped closer to the young boy, putting a hand in his shoulder and looking at him with far too much kindness and warmth and understanding than he deserved. “It wasn’t your fault, Henry, we know that. Emma knew that too.”

That did it.

The tears he was fighting so hard against showing her family flooded his eyes and spilled out down his cheeks streaking and smearing even more of Ruby’s work.

Before he could even take a breath arms were wrapped around him, embracing him with motherly love and warmth that nearly rivaled Regina’s as he sobbed so hard he shook himself and his comforter.

“It’s sorry!” he sobbed in Snows arms. David wrapped his arm around the young boy and put his hand on the back of his head and slowly stroked his short brown hair, making the small boy sob harder when he realized they probably comforted Emma this same way.  “I’m so sorry, I didn’t- I didn’t want her to die, I swear!”

“We know,” Snow told him, her own voice full of tears. “We know you didn’t, Henry, It’s alright.” After a moment she lifted his face up so she was staring in his eyes. “You didn’t put her in that arena, you didn’t ask to be there either.”

Her eyes flickered up to the flag of Panem fluttering in the ocean breeze outside the window and only then did Henry see a flicker of anger, a spark of hatred not for him but the Capital, for the men and women who cheapened Emma’s sacrifice, who bet on her survival, who looked at her death and Henry’s trauma as nothing but entertainment.

When he calmed down enough Henry pulled away from the warm couple and took a breath to try to steady his nerves.

“I just… I wanna know why she pushed me out of the way,” Henry admitted. “She fought so hard to survive and then she just… she gave it all up. For me…”

A sad smile replaced Snow’s fury for the Capital but it was David who spoke.

“We have someone special we’d like you to meet,” said David, signaling someone by the doorway who Henry didn’t realize was there at first.

A boy no older than fourteen who at first glance one might mistake Henry and this boy for twins, the only significant difference was black hair like Snow’s rather than brown like Henry’s but they had the same eye shape, the same jawline, he wouldn’t have bet more than an inch of difference between the two of them.

“This is our son, Neal,” Snow introduced the small boy whose eyes were as red as his mother and father’s who only offered a meager failed attempt at a smile. “He and Emma were close. Very close, they were practically best friends.”

Henry knew it wasn’t meant to guilt him but that now all too familiar feeling overwhelmed him as he and Neal looked at one another. “I’m sorry, Neal. I didn’t… I didn’t want what happened to Emma to happen. She didn’t deserve that.”

Neal just gave him a sliver of a sad uncomfortable smile before he bowed his head, unable or unwilling to look at Henry anymore. Realizing his son wasn’t in a talkative mood, David kissed the top of Neal’s head which apparently was the permission he needed to leave the staging area.

“Emma loved Neal more than anyone and he loved her,” Snow told Henry once Neal was far enough out of earshot. “We think that’s why she saved you. She saw you in him. Watching you die would have been like letting Neal die, and she couldn’t let that happen.”

Henry nodded, his eyes locked on the teenage boy who was partly responsible for saving his life.

It made sense. A lot of sense, actually and in a way it made him feel better knowing there was a sensible, tangible reason behind Emma saving his life. If he saw someone in there who looked like Roland he wouldn’t have been able to kill him and probably would have sacrificed himself for them as well.

But now something else was nagging at him. If Neal ever found out his sister was gone just because Henry happened to look rather identical...

“...Don’t tell him,” Henry pleaded, his eyes flickering between both Snow and David. “Please. Don’t make him feel even a little responsible, that’s… no matter what you tell him it wasn’t his fault he won’t believe you. He’ll blame himself, you’ll ruin his life, you can’t do that to him.”

What started off as a desperate plea fizzled out into a mumble as he looked at the dusty unkempt wooden floor beneath his feet, missing the concerned look between the parents.

“There’s something else we wanted to talk to you about, too.” The tone in her voice, far more cautious than before, caught Henry off guard and he looked up from the group at them.

“I recognized the hand tremors you had on stage,” David spoke up. “My father had them too whenever he had to work late in the sheep meadows in Ten.”

Henry quickly his shaking hands in his pants pockets as if that could make them forget what they saw. He looked away, embarrassed.

“He wasn’t allowed to drink during the work day so his hand would start to shake until he got his hand on some rum. Henry…” The blue eyed man waited until the victor looked up at him before he spoke. “I don’t blame you for needing a way to cope and I won’t judge you for it but I know my daughter wouldn’t have wanted to give her life for you just so you could throw it away drinking. You’re only fourteen years old, you’re too young to be an alcoholic.”

 _I’m also only fourteen years old and responsible for three peoples deaths_ , he said to himself rather bitterly but he thought better than to admit that out loud when this family was trying to help him.

“You know how you can make yourself feel better about Emma? How to make sure her sacrifice isn’t wasted?” Snow grabbed Henry by the shoulders, a teary smile on her face like she knew these words would be the changing factor in life. “You live, Henry. Finish school, tell stories you wanna tell, get married, find a way to move to the Capital and have children.”

Without warning she wrapped her arms around the small boy, stroking his hair and whispering so lightly he almost missed it, which meant the Peacekeepers and any cameras missed it too. “And when the time comes, you help fight them. You understand me? Don’t let them keep doing this to our children.”

He didn’t trust himself to be able to speak low enough like Snow had, terrified of the aspect of the President overhearing and killing his mom, Robin and Roland as a way to keep him in line so instead he just hugged her closer, hoping that she and The Capital took the gesture as him giving the answer they each wanted.

After pulling away she kissed him on top of his head, her  smile shining every bit as bright as if tears weren’t shining in her eyes. “Even though there’s nothing to forgive I know you need to hear this so we forgive you, Henry. It’s time to forgive yourself.”

After that much needed proclamation and a promise not to take another drink while he was on his tour, Snow, David and Neal left the drab building and headed out to the party full of different varieties of grilled fish, boiled lobsters, clams with melted butter and all sort of sea-food delicacies that anyone outside of District Four and the Capital could never hope to even lay eyes on. After assuring John he would be alright Ruby took him back to his room where she touched up his makeup and made him look appropriate for the party.

“You sure you’re okay?” she asked, adding a spray of her own creation to his skin that would add a slight shimmer in the sun.

“I’ll be fine.” Henry assured her, wincing as she added a thin layer of eyeliner followed by more shimmer spray.

“Good. Because you…” She handed the mirror to him, her ears perking up excitedly when he gave her a nod and smile of approval. “Look even better than you did before!”

After apologizing for messing up her work and promising to meet her at the party Ruby left him alone in the room with only the sound of the waves and seagulls and his own thoughts to keep him company. He walked over and looked out the window of the hotel at the ocean in the distance. The low hanging sun was beaming down on the ocean making the blue of the water glitter like diamonds.

It really was a beautiful District. Even the smell was different and beautiful, smelling of salt and sand and shore as opposed to pine and earth that Henry was constantly surrounded by. His smile faded when he wondered briefly rather or not Emma would have enjoyed the forests and lakes of his district as much as he was enjoying her oceans and shore.

Suddenly the waters of District Four didn’t seem so beautiful.

Henry turned away from the window and walked over to his bedside table. He looked at the half full bottle of his whiskey and grabbed it, walking into the bathroom, trying to remember the promise he made just an hour ago to Emma’s parents.

But as he stood over the porcelain sink, holding the bottle aloft, prepared to dump it down the drains he made the mistake of closing his eyes and saw Emma’s body crushed under that tree, heard the branch spine her spine, felt her hands shove him out of the way, heard the fire cackling…

A tear fell from his eye and dropped down onto the porcelain. His knees began shaking, his memories tormenting and destroying him and making his hands tremble worse as it’s ever been. His mouth went dry and his tongue felt like sandpaper when he went to wet his lips.

He was so thirsty. So thirsty… Thirsty for the memories of Emma, Mal and Leroy to go away, thirty for the smell of the smoke and sight of the blood to disappear, thirsty to have instead died in that arena than stand here celebrating his win.

Thirsty for the contents of this bottle.

So, telling himself he would keep his promise once this tour ended, Henry turned away from the sink and brought the bottle to his lips.

 

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